


pink matter

by betharue



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types
Genre: Electra Heart - Freeform, Gen, Songfic, Triggers listed in each chapter
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-02-16
Updated: 2016-02-16
Packaged: 2018-05-20 21:03:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6024784
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/betharue/pseuds/betharue
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You are Drew Tanaka and you've got an electric heart, hon.</p>
            </blockquote>





	pink matter

**Author's Note:**

> inspired by the Electra Heart era from Marina and the Diamonds
> 
> song and video interpretations from here: http://popheaval.blogspot.com/2013/08/second-thoughts-about-electra-heart.html

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A woman is seen sitting in the bathroom looking solemnly at her reflection in the mirror. It is implied that she has recently been in an abusive and unhealthy relationship - "Don't wanna live in fear and loathing"—and she also hasn't found her place in the world yet, her true identity: "I've lived a lot of different lives/Been different people many times". Then she proceeds to cut her hair—a much used trope for the discovery of newfound identity and/or strength. Electra Heart is born.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tw in this chapter for abuse and adults dating children

The mirror is broken and so are you. You and the mirror have a lot in common, actually. You’re both cracked, you’re both dirty, and you were both broken by the same asshole that owns the shit apartment you’re sitting in right now. You’re a lot luckier than the mirror, though. At least you’re only a little bruised, whereas the mirror is nearly shattered. Whatever god may exist in this world must’ve liked you, because that baseball bat he swung was definitely aimed towards you face and you barely got a chance to duck before it slammed into the mirror and sent shards of glass all over your vanity. The glass fell into your hair and dug its way into the baby-soft skin of your arms and under the your fingernails into tender flesh, but at least you didn’t get your pretty face bashed in. Can’t say the same for the mirror, unfortunately. Poor thing. You feel a weird sort of sympathy for it.

You push yourself off the floor where you’ve been sprawled out since _he_ (you don’t even want to give him the respect of saying his name) left you. The baseball bat might’ve missed you, but his fists didn’t. He’s always had perfect aim. Your eye throbs and you can feel it swelling up with pus and blood. Bruises are forming on your torso and legs, never your arms since those can be harder to cover up this time of year. You don’t have to look at them to know they’re going to be purple, maybe some dark yellow at the edges. Pushing yourself up gets glass pressed deeper into your hands and some of it breaks the skin. You’re past the point of being bothered by that kind of pain, though, so you don’t cry out. You push and push until you’re standing upright, a little wobbly but stable enough. You sit down properly on the vanity seat, a lumpy old chair he got from his grandmother. There’s glass on that, too, and it presses into the seat of your pants.

You look into it, that mirror, and you see your warped reflection staring back at you. You take in the same brown eyes and the same pale but marked skin and the same face, _pretty, pretty, pretty._ It looks like a funhouse reflection from a horror movie, but it’s intact enough for you to brush your hair as you usually do. The glass pieces get caught in your brush and occasionally dig into your scalp when they get pressed down. It’s not the worst pain you’ve ever felt, so you ignore it. Bloodied hair can be explained away with hair dryer gone bad or a particularly sharp comb or catfights, but the cuts on your arms and the dark bruises on your pale body would raise a few questions. Not that you talk to people anyways. He forbids you from talking to anyone but him.

He used to let you talk to anyone you wanted. You had no restrictions on life, no carefully set rules to prevent him from leaving you. He’d been so nice to you at first. He was a friend of your foster family, which should’ve been an indication that he was trouble since that family had been one of the worst you’d been through. Besides, any 20 year old that hit on girls your age is automatically gross, but it never crossed your mind to take a look at those warning signs. You were wearing rose colored glasses, and all red flags just looked like flags. When he offered to take you away from your host family and to another town for a new life, you couldn’t have packed quicker. You wished you’d known that he would end up taking you to some unnamed run down neighborhood in the middle of Montana and that he would never tell you anything or let you go anywhere. You probably still would’ve gone because you really wanted to get out of the system, but at least you would’ve been prepared. Preparation is key. If you don’t expect something, you get emotional when it happens and you hate that.

It takes a lot of time and a few tears with the jagged shards, but you eventually get the glass out of your hair with little blood spilled in the process. Still, more shards are scattered all over the vanity and on the floor and embedded in your body. You choose to ignore it; he’s gone out for drinks with his trash friends and you’re left to your own devices, so it’s not like anyone’s going to tell you to take care of it. He usually doesn't come back from drinking until the afternoon of the next day, so you’ve gone lots of time to sit and cry and think until he comes back for round two.

A shudder passes through you and you taste bile. Just the thought of his face makes you want to cry more than the glass ever could and your hands begin to shake. You’re _so_ not excited for round two.

Before he left, he gave you very simple instructions. The first was not to leave. The second was not to talk to anyone. The third, and this truly hit you harder than most things he had done to her, was to cut your hair. All of it, every gorgeous, black strand was to be chopped off. You’ve forgotten what you did to deserve this. He says you’re always doing something wrong. You might’ve talked too loud or maybe you didn’t wash the dishes correctly or maybe you were just there and he happened to be in a bad mood today. Doesn’t matter. He left a pair of scissors on the vanity for you, long ones made for gliding through paper instead of shearing hair. You know that using the wrong scissors is bad for your hair, but you didn’t tell him that. He probably knew. You pick them up and see that they’re coated in a thin layer of rust. When you open them, they make a sound like an animal’s groan. You hold them up to your hair, one of your favorite things about you, and _snip, snip, snip._ Just a few seconds later and it’s all gone. Well, most of it’s gone. What left is cut into a not-quite stylish bob that just reaches your chin. It’s choppy and uneven and it makes you want to cry. _Nobody will want me now,_ you think.

You try not to reflect on that and instead get up to make yourself some dinner. It’s pretty late, almost midnight, and your stomach starts to grumble like a washing machine. You’ll have to clean up his mess before he gets back or you’ll be in for an even worse punishment, but you don’t know where the broom is. The only thing left in the cabinets is instant ramen, which you despise because it’s way too salty and tastes so artificial that you're not convinced that any real animals or vegetables were involved, so you consider going out to eat while he’s away. You hesitate, though. You innocently did it once before, but it was already in the afternoon and he was coming in the door right while you were coming out. It was the first time he ever hit you and the first time you realized just how bad of a situation you’d gotten yourself into. You don’t want a repeat. But he just left an hour ago. You could make it if you didn’t go too far. Hell, you could even run away and he wouldn’t even notice until he came home tomorrow.

He’s broke as fuck and there’s no other food in the cabinets or the fridge, so you decide to throw caution to the wind and sneak out to shoplift something to eat. You don’t have a lot of clothes, but you don’t think anyone will care if your shirt is a little ripped. Ripped shirts are in, right? You think you remember them being a trend the last time you went shoplifting. He always locks the doors from the inside and you don’t have a key, but picking the lock of the darkened window and going down the fire escape is just as effective. It’s a trick you learned about a month into living with him.

You’ve learned a lot, not-yet-Drew. You’re quite clever. _She_ will tell you that. She’ll tell you how clever and witty you are and you’ll want to cry because you never would’ve imagined that anyone would ever describe you as either of those things. But as you shove a bobby pin in the hole of the safety lock and push the window up, you don't know about her yet, so you step out onto the fire escape and plan on how you'll manage your time so that everything is clean when he comes back.

It’s cold outside. Unseasonably cold. It pisses you off, you really can’t ever catch a break. The wind makes it worse and it bites at your skin through the holes in your already thin t-shirt. You didn’t bring a jacket so you rub your arms in small circles with your fingers to get some heat. You used to have long hair to protect your shoulders and back, but it’s all gone now and the bob isn’t even long enough to keep your neck covered. You’re close to running back to the house just to get out of the cold, but you you try to get through it. By the time you admit that you can't handle it, you've been wandering aimlessly for about a half an hour and you realize that you’re lost. The whole damn town looks exactly the same and it’s darker than you thought it would be. You’re almost positive that you’ve walked past that same Walgreens six times, but you keep walking. Something about exercise being good for increasing blood flow and heat or whatever crap you learned the last time you took biology. You don’t feel any warmer but it’s worth a shot.

The Walgreens that keeps finding you looks pretty warm, though. _Walgreens food is probably no worse than fast food_ , you think. _Might as well stop there if I’m going to be lost out here._ You walk in shivering and nearly sigh as the warm air hits your bare skin. The store is still pretty shoddy, but the lights are bright and it’s stocked with snacks. The white walls are so different from the grey ones in your pseudo home and it makes you feel a little bit better.

You aren’t sure what to steal. There’s just so much food running up and down the aisles that you’re a little overwhelmed. It’s more food than you’ve seen in a long time. You can’t even remember what kind of junk food you like; he never let you have junk food because it might “ruin” your figure. Yet he only had ramen in the kitchen, which is probably just as unhealthy as the mini bag of Lay’s that you pick up. You think that you like Lay’s, but you can’t remember. You do remember a weird commercial of some lady spending an unreasonable amount of time eating one chip from the bag and the buttery yellow package is tempting, so they probably taste somewhat good. And, more importantly, the bag is small.

You brought a crumpled up 5 dollar bill that you swiped off the kitchen counter (probably next week’s food budget) just in case you get caught so that you could convince them that you intended to buy whatever you steal. It’s enough to cover for the chips, but you hide them up your shirt anyways. You poke a little hole in the bag to let the air out and you flatten it against your skin and wrap your arms around yourself. You’re too hungry to settle for so little and you don’t think you have enough money anyways, so you wrap a bag of beef jerky around your calf and use the legs of your jeans to cover it. The store only has one camera and no alarms, so it’s easy pickings. You slip a few travel size bottles of vodka into your socks for good measure and pick a bag of 99¢ gummy bears to buy to avoid suspicion. It looks weird if you don’t buy anything or if you’re too quick to leave and getting arrested would probably make him really mad.

The brightly lit and multicolored makeup section starts calling your name after a while. You think that you used to wear makeup at one point, but you’re not sure anymore. You vaguely remember your birth mother, a beautiful woman who would apply red lipstick to her perfect pout as you watched in fascination. He doesn’t let you wear makeup because he thinks it’ll tempt other people to take you away or something equally asinine. The cosmetic section is one of the biggest in the store and takes up an entire wall, which you think is weird since this town does not seem like beauty queen central. They have nine or ten brands and more kinds of makeup than you can care to count and it’s the most glamorous thing you’ve seen in years. The first thing that really catches your eye is a stick of pink eyeliner. The brand isn’t the most reputable or high-end, but the pink is so pretty and you didn’t even know that they made eyeliner in that color. You consider buying it for kicks and your hand reaches out for it, but you quickly decide against it and pull away. You don’t have any use for eyeliner. He doesn’t let you wear any makeup. Still, it’s a nice color. The advertisement says that it glides across the skin and sounds nice. You almost feel like someone's pushing you to get it. Against your better judgement, you grab it and slip the thin liner down the leg of your pants and head to the counter for checkout. You have enough money to cover both the liner and the gum, but you steal the liner anyways. It’s more exciting that way. You feel like a rebel, fighting against the capitalist masses or whatever but mostly you're rebelling against him. You're a little scared of what will happen if he finds out about it, but if you hide it well enough he can't hurt you, right?

After buying and stealing, you sit outside in the parking lot for dinner. You drink some of your stolen vodka to keep you warm and it burns in your stomach and heats your whole body. The twig-thin blonde working at the register said it was 12:47, so you have plenty of time to sit down and eat before you have to head back. The jerky is hard to chew and salty, but you’ve already gotten out of the store and it’s dense enough to fill your stomach so you grin and bear it. The chips are better than you thought they would be, even though you still think that the lady in the commercial was going way overboard. You save the gum for later. You don’t want to risk him to smell anything that’s not ramen on your breath and the gum smells enough like toothpaste that he wouldn’t be suspicious. There’s a puddle next to you, it must’ve rained the day before while you were to distracted by the incoming fists in your face, and you use it as a mirror to apply the pink eyeliner. You’ve never put on eyeliner before so the line is crooked, but you think the color makes your eyes pop so you leave it on. You can wash it off at home before he gets back.

You don’t know how long you’ve been out there when a car pulls up next to you. It’s probably the nicest car in town; a clean, black Mercedes. You don’t know the year or the model but you recognize the insignia from back when you would watch the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week every year and you know it’s a decent car. The lot’s empty, save you, but the driver pulls up right in the spot next to you and rolls down the window.

“You sure look lonely ma'am,” the driver, presumably male but there's no way of telling, says. He has a slight southern accent, which is out of place when you’re so far in the north. You can’t really see his face because you’re still sitting down and a little tipsy, but the tip of his cigarette sticks out of the car and you can see black sunglasses and blurred, tan skin.

“I’m fine,” you say. You wish he would leave and you’re starting to sweat with nervousness. You don’t know him and you have a bad enough track record with men as it is. There’s enough space for you to run if necessary, but he does have the advantage of being in a car. You could run onto the sidewalk or into someone’s backyard to escape. Maybe you could just go back to Walgreens until he leaves you alone or something.

“You don’t look fine to me,” he says. He gently taps his cigarette on the edge of the car door to get rid of some of the ash. It comes down like grey snow and lands on the tip of your shoe.

“Well, I _am_ . I need to go home anyways.” You get up because you don’t think you can handle another mysterious older man (he looks to be about _his_ age and it scares you).

The car follows you as you walk away, a metal lion stalking a pink gazelle.

“It’s pretty late miss. A pretty girl like you shouldn’t be walking around this late at night alone. Let me drive you home, for extra security.”

“That’s not necessary.”

“At least tell me your name.” His voice takes on an annoying needy tone that makes you want to run even faster. You tell him no and then you run. This whole town is so small and close together that the Walgreens is just a few blocks away from a row of houses. You start speeding through a random person’s lawn to get rid of him, but he follows you.

“Wait a minute,” he calls out, “I think I’ve heard of you! Are you that guy Julian’s girl! Darlene or something, right?”

You freeze in your tracks and the abrupt halt makes you fall onto the cool grass. Your vision blurs and your heart pounds so hard that it actually physically hurts you because he _knows_ him, or at least knows of him. Maybe he’s even friends, but his tone is neutral for now. Anyone who’s friends with him is automatically someone to avoid in your book. His friends, those men who saw what he did to you and knew how old you were and did nothing. But it’s like you’ve crystallized. You’re too scared to move away and even more scared of what would happen if he heard that you disrespected his friends, so you answer him.

“Daryl.”

“What?’

“My name’s Daryl, not Darlene.”

“Sorry miss,” he says amiably. “I don’t really hang out with Julian. Rumor has it that he beats on his girl. Never even lets her out of the house. That true?” You nod. It’s probably not a good idea. For all you know, it could be a trap he set up just so he’d have an excuse to beat you some more. You’re too nervous to even think straight, so you don’t leave. You’re still on your hands and knees on some stranger’s lawn and he’s still sitting in his car on the street next to you. The alcohol made you forget how cold it was, but now you’re starting to remember.

“Damn, that’s awful. My momma made me promise to never treat my woman like that. You should really get out of there before it gets any worse, Miss Daryl.”

“I don’t have anywhere to go,” you cry, all traces of resistance gone. It just feels nice to talk to someone about him and what he does to you after not being able to talk to _anyone_ for so long. You don’t quite trust him but you’re desperate enough not to care.

“Hey, I normally don’t do these kinds of things, but I’m heading out of town right now. I could take you with me, if you like. My momma used to say that anything’s better than staying with a man who beats on you.”

Your first instinct is to refuse. _Bad track record with men_ , you tell yourself. He could easily be as abusive as he is. He could be a murderer, the kind that carves into you and tears your intestines out and cuts them into little slivers before killing you months later. Maybe he’ll take you straight back to the apartment, where it’ll be revealed that it was all a trick he’ll be waiting with his baseball bat. The mirror can’t take your hits forever.

But you hear a voice in your head telling you to trust him. It’s not your own and it sounds like it cares about you. It’s the same nagging feeling that made you steal the pink eyeliner back at Walgreens and the same voice that warned you against leaving with your current boyfriend. When it happened that time, you ignored it because it seemed like silly paranoia at the time. Look where that got you.

_Not everyone is out to screw you over, dear,_ the voice whispers. It sounds familiar and almost motherly. You imagine that it’s your birth mother trying to protect you from the grave. You absentmindedly rub your necklace, a white dove charm on a simple silver chain. You’ve had it since you were a child and it was the only thing found with you in that abandoned, broken house after the mysterious accident that orphaned you at eleven. You assume it once belonged to your mother, and that makes it the only valuable thing you own.

_Not everyone is out to screw you over. Go for it, honey._

Later you’ll probably think about the serious psychological implications of hearing voices, but in that moment, you run into the stranger's car without any other considerations.

“Woah, ma'am,” the man says once you’re in his car. Now that you can see him properly, you see that he’s got dark skin with straight black hair that’s combed sideways into side swept bangs. His eyes are brown like yours and he looks a lot younger than you originally thought, maybe closer to your age than his but you don’t think you’re that lucky. “Don’t you want to gather your things?”

You look down at your necklace and shake your head. “This is the only thing I have that I want to keep.” Nothing else matters to you. Everything else you own was paid for and carefully picked out by him, and you don’t want any more reminders of being kept in his grasp. The man seems to understand and nods respectfully.

“Well, if we’re going to be driving buddies, I think you should at least know who I am, miss.” He holds out his hand for a shake. You like how classy he is; every man you’ve ever known wasn’t nearly as considerate. “The name’s Murphy, last name classified.”

“I’m Daryl, last name Tanaka,” you say and return his shake. You’re not good at handshakes, but Murphy’s is solid and firm. It seems like a good way to judge his character.

“Miss Tanaka, I’m glad to have you with me on this journey, then.”

“Where are you going?” you ask, more out of politeness than anything else because you don’t really care where you end up as you’re out of town.

“I have a very special job that requires me to travel all around the country,” Murphy explains, and your eyebrows quirk up at the mention of his “special job” but you’re silent. “I stopped here for a few days because my friend owns a bar, that’s where I met your Julian. He was in some bar fight and I had to step in. I asked around about him and that’s how I heard about you, someone even had a picture, but your hair was longer. Now I have to move on to Portland, but I still need to make some pit stops.”

_Portland,_ you think. _That’s so far away._

“That’s perfect,” you say. Murphy smiles and starts driving again. You don’t fully trust him honestly, but you trust that feeling and you trust that voice, and it’s telling you to go for it. You lean back in the comfortable leather seats and run your fingers on the edge of the window.

“Nice makeup, by the way,” Murphy says as you reach the city limits. “I’ve never seen pink on a girl’s eyes like that before. It makes them look browner. It’s a nice look on you.”

You don’t respond, but you smile and fall asleep to the sound of the car engine.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i should not be starting another fic but here I am 
> 
> also I was too excited to post this to call up my beta so if u see any mistakes please let me know


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